Advanced Armory
= Advanced Armory (Task Force VALKYRIE) = The Bleeder (••) Resembling nothing so much as a jackhammer with a small satellite dish in place of the drill bit, the Bleeder is one of Task Force: VALKYRIE’s newest developments. The Bleeder is the latest in what VALKYRIE’s scientists refer to as “crowd-safe” weaponry, designed to target and eliminate supernatural threats, specifically vampires and their servants, while presenting little threat to potential victims or bystanders. Only recently moved out of the laboratory, the Bleeder has begun field-testing with a number of field ops teams around the globe. The Bleeder fires a focused microburst of energy in a tightly constrained beam. Through processes not fully understood even by the scientists who discovered them, this energy reacts violently with the quasi-biological functions of the vampire’s blood, with the net result that it evacuates the creature’s body, usually in a violent manner. Laboratory tests have recorded results ranging from a minor leakage of the tear ducts to vomiting. In some test cases, the blood actually shot out of the subject’s pores in a fine red mist. While not entirely eliminated, the weapon presents a minimal threat level to humans and natural animals, as they lack the critical meta-biology of vampire blood. Function: The Bleeder is treated as a ranged weapon, subject to all the normal rules for ranged combat. Attacking with the Bleeder is a Dexterity + Firearms attack. Roll Results Dramatic Failure: The Bleeder overloads and critical components are thrown out of precise alignment. The wielder takes one point of bashing damage from the electrical surge, and the device is rendered inoperable until it is recalibrated. Recalibration requires five successes on an extended Intelligence + Science roll, with each roll representing a minute of work. Failure: As with an ordinary ranged attack, the target suffers no damage or ill effect. Success: Instead of inflicting damage to the target’s Health, the “Bleeder” causes a vampire, ghoul, or any creature that consumes and stores blood in its own body to lose one Willpower (or the equivalent) per success rolled. This Willpower physically leaves the creature’s body in rivulets or sprays of blood, with velocity and force increasing with successes. If more successes are rolled than the target has remaining blood in its system, extra successes roll over into lethal damage. Exceptional Success: Not only does the target lose a large amount of stored blood, but it also suffers lethal damage equal to one half the number of successes rolled due to the violence with which the blood leaves its body. Blood vessels literally explode; skin and muscle are torn by the force of the exsanguination. Special: The “Bleeder” does not have quite the same explosive interaction with non-vampiric blood, but the energy it pours out can cause premature breakdown of blood cells or the restriction of blood vessels. Against creatures without a stored pool of blood, the weapon inflicts intense headaches and malaise: successes on an attack roll are taken not as damage, but as penalties to the target’s actions, to a maximum of -5 dice. The penalty lasts for five turns and is often accompanied by a nosebleed. Compound Rounds (•) to (•••••) , Renewable) Most monsters have a physical vulnerability to a fairly common substance; it can often be hard for a hunter to know which weapon he should be using against a given supernatural. When something tall, dark, and furry moves in the shadows, a hunter only has seconds to determine if he’s facing a wolf-beast Changeling, a lycanthrope, a shapeshifting witch, or a vampire wearing a wolf-form — and grab the right tool for the job. Compound Rounds save lives by incorporating trace amounts of the elements most commonly dangerous to supernatural creatures into a single bullet. This ammunition saves hunters precious time, and gives them the confidence they are neutralizing their target — regardless of its specific nature — in the most efficient manner possible. Function: Compound Rounds contain small amounts of just about any substance rumored to affect supernatural creatures: cold iron, gold, silver, salt, a variety of wood slivers, holy water (in break-on-impact globules), communion wafer crumbs, mustard seed, and a smattering of various dried plants like wolfsbane, rose petals, clover, and St. John’s Wort. This combination grants 9-Agains on attacks with these bullets, and always inflicts lethal damage, even on creatures who normally only take bashing damage from bullets. Special: The Compound Rounds Merit is Renewable, using the same Special rules as for Etheric Rounds (Hunter: the Vigil, p. 151). Like Etheric Rounds, Compound Rounds can be used by those who do not possess a Task Force: VALKYRIE RFID chip. Etheric Goggles (•• or ••••) Ghosts, demons, and witches all have the ability to pass unseen by mortal senses. Even vampires, according to some stories, have the ability to send their minds out of their cold, dead bodies and explore the world in secret. With etheric goggles, Task Force: VALKYRIE can bring the fight to them. Etheric goggles operate on the same principle as the etheric tracker, utilizing chemically treated lenses to detect entities in Twilight. Until recently, they were standard kit for field agents, but since a rash of psychosis among agents who used them extensively in the early 2000s, top brass has restricted their use. Function: Etheric goggles look like slightly bulkier, more complicated versions of the night-vision goggles employed by the United States Armed Forces. In fact, etheric goggles serve as perfectly functional night-vision goggles, allowing the wearer to see perfectly — albeit in monochrome — in pitch darkness Their primary use comes into play when the hunter flips a pair of oddly purplish lenses down over the infrared light source on the goggles’ brow, allowing the wearer to see objects in Twilight as clearly as if they were manifested physically. The process required to treat the lenses to render Twilight visible creates weird distortions of the physical world. While the hunter is using the goggles to see Twilight objects, he suffers a -2 penalty to Perception checks made to notice anything in the physical world. For four dots, a VALKYRIE agent may requisition a more advanced model that can pick up trace etheric disturbances left behind by incorporeal creatures after they pass. These traces appear as a softly luminescent purple cloud that trails behind a spirit or ghost, enabling it to be tracked. The trail fades after 10 minutes per point of Power the spirit entity possesses. (In the case of beings that use the full nine Attribute spread, such as a Twilight-walking witch, use the highest of Strength, Intelligence or Presence.) Etheric goggles have a battery life of six hours as a night vision device, or three hours when used to see Twilight objects. Etheric Rounds (• or •••••; Renewable) Produced in top-secret, experimental laboratories around the country, these bullets have been bombarded with a cocktail of exotic, high-energy particles that infuse peculiar pseudo-physical properties into the lead. Etheric Rounds are delivered to field operatives in clear, plastic magazines (Task Force: VALKYRIE manufactures versions in every caliber and magazine style currently on the market) and emit a faint blue light from their tips. When fired, this light becomes as bright as a tracer round, making concealment all but impossible. The bullet is actually consumed by this light, which converts the metal into a pseudo-etheric state that VALKYRIE scientists believe to be a heretofore undiscovered “fifth state” of matter. Function: Etheric Rounds allow the hunter to inflict normal firearm damage against manifested ghosts, spirits and other incorporeal entities. They don’t count as blessed items, and thus inflict lethal rather than aggravated damage. Etheric Rounds can be used against corporeal targets as well, but the attack suffers a -1 penalty, as the pseudo-etheric harmonics are less disruptive to living tissue. Special: The Etheric Rounds Merit is Renewable; for each dot the character has in this Merit, Task Force: VALKYRIE supplies him with one clip of Etheric Rounds for a specific weapon type (e.g. MP-5, Glock 19) every session. A character may purchase multiple instances of Etheric Rounds, each specifying a different weapon. For example, an assault team leader might have Etheric Rounds (AR-15) ••• and Etheric Rounds (P90) ••; every session, he has three magazines’ worth of etheric ammo for his AR-15 and two magazines for his P90. Etheric Rounds, unlike most Advanced Armory Merits, can be used by anyone, even if they lack a Task Force: VALKYRIE RFID chip. Equalizer Grenade (•••; Renewable) The old phrase “monsters in human skin” has its element of truth, but there are things out there in the dark that hide behind only the thinnest veneer of humanity. Sometimes, when a Task Force: VALKYRIE strike team storms some unholy nightmare’s den, what looks like a few hillbillies and drifters turns into a wall of fur and muscle and savage sharp teeth. The Equalizer grenade helps to level the playing field. Studies performed on captured monsters of various classifications have revealed a commonality amongst many: when a living creature changes its shape, no matter the method behind it, a surge of erratic brain activity buried deep in the sensory cortex immediately precedes the change. VALKYRIE scientists have speculated that this is the brain trying to process the sensory overload of radical body morphism, but the truth is countless vivisections have been unable to give any conclusive answers. Nevertheless, VALKYRIE munitions experts were able to engineer the equalizer grenade from the test data. Function: Operating on the same principles that cause certain patterns of brightly flashing lights to induce epileptic seizures, the equalizer grenade pulses in a pattern that causes focused microseizures in that portion of the brain that seems to govern shapeshifting. The grenade is harmless to humans, and in fact to anything not attempting to alter its form, but the microseizures flood neural channels with “white noise” that effectively blocks shapeshifting. Throwing an equalizer grenade is a Dexterity + Athletics roll. The grenade has a “Damage” of 4, but instead of inflicting Health damage, any living creature within five yards of the grenade must succeed at a roll of (Stamina - 5) or return to its natural shape and be unable to change its shape for five turns. Special: The Equalizer Grenade Merit is Renewable; once per story per instance of the Merit a hunter possesses, Task Force: VALKYRIE will resupply him with an Equalizer Grenade. Equalizer grenades work against any living creature, regardless of the means by which it shapeshifts. A werewolf’s innate shapeshifting, a witch’s skin-changing spell, or a possessed woman’s flesh warped by the demon that controls her are equally susceptible. Vampires and other undead that are not animated by anything even vaguely resembling biology are resistant to the grenade’s effects. Treat an undead creature’s stamina as two points higher when calculating the effect of an Equalizer grenade. An equalizer grenade can only be used once; the intensity of light required to trigger the microseizures slags the electronics and turns the battery into a useless lump. Etheric Tracker (••••) Monsters, whatever their stripe, tend to be elusive. Whether it’s a vampire’s ability to cloud men’s minds, a witch’s teleportation spell, or a werewolf’s really damn disconcerting way of just disappearing sometimes, if Task Force: VALKYRIE can’t find it, they can’t very well tag it or kill it. The etheric tracker is one step toward nullifying that advantage. By marking a target with a small “tag” that has been bombarded with exotic, high-energy particles similar to those underlying the creation of etheric rounds, Task Force: VALKYRIE can track its quarry even through realms beyond mortal ken. Function: The etheric tracker consists of two parts: the main unit is roughly the size and shape of a large pistol (Size 1), which uses precisely aligned electromagnets to fire a tracking pellet at considerable velocity, embedding it below the target’s skin. The pellets themselves are roughly the size of a grain of sand, and are small enough that the target must roll Wits + Composure to notice the impact. Even if it is noticed, the sensation is comparable to the bite of a small insect. A handheld scanner, the second part of the tracker, picks up the pseudo-etheric radiation given off by the pellet and displays a location on an LCD screen. Earlier models only showed approximate distance and direction; current field models integrate a GPS locator and street maps of the area, allowing the team to pinpoint the precise location of its quarry. Since the tracker actually follows the etheric signature of the pellet and not a radio frequency or other, more earthly signatures, it can follow creatures even when they slip into an invisible, intangible state. Likewise, the pellet’s pseudo-etheric nature allows it to anchor in the resonant structure of a manifested ghost or spirit as well as the flesh of a corporeal entity. The current model cannot track a target that fully departs this plane of existence, but Task Force: VALKYRIE researchers are hard at work on cracking that puzzle as well. An etheric tracker has an effective range of only half a mile, but this range is not hampered by buildings or other obstructions. A single pellet can be tracked for 24 hours before its etheric resonance fades. Special: An Etheric Tracker comes with a full magazine of pellets, which resembles a magazine for a semiautomatic pistol filled with blue sand. The sheer number of pellets means the Etheric Tracker’s ammunition is effectively unlimited. Should an agent lose his supply of etheric pellets, a call to his home office and a successful Wits + Politics roll can get him a replacement within one week, provided he can get to a population center or military base. An exceptional success sees the pellets delivered within one day. Frequency Pulse Emitter (••; Renewable) Durability 2, Size 1, Structure 3 Canines can hear noises pitched in ultra-high frequencies that humans cannot. The scientists who designed the devices for TF:V created Frequency Pulse Emitters working with the same general principles applied to werewolves. A Frequency Pulse Emitter (sometimes called Dog Whistles by TF:V soldiers) is a modified flashbang grenade that emits an eardrum rupturing pulse of sound that can only be heard by canines and werewolves. Function: A Frequency Pulse Emitter is used like any other grenade. The operator primes the grenade and tosses it towards the enemy with a Dexterity + Athletics roll. Frequency Pulse Emitter grenades have what is called a short fuse, meaning the grenade will go off within a few seconds of being primed. This gives an enemy little chance to pick up the grenade and throw it back at its former owner. Any werewolf within 10 yards of the Dog Whistle when it “explodes” must succeed at a Stamina + Composure roll at a -3 penalty or be stunned. The penalty to resist being stunned is increased to -5 if the werewolf is in either wolf or near-wolf form. A Frequency Pulse Emitter has no effect on humans unless the character has increased their normal range of hearing in some manner. It may work on any creature (vampire, witch, etc.) assuming an animal-form or using heightened senses. The Gatekeeper Device (•••) It’s actually not a device: it’s a thin-skinned black bodysuit lined with tiny white filaments—and, because it’s been designed by Project FORT, the suit is also marked with a number of stitched-in occult, spiritual, and scientific symbols. It covers everything: even the hunter’s face. The hunter sees via dark goggles sewn into the bodysuit mask. At present, only five suits of this type even exist. FORT does not have the resources or materials to make more. Function: Wearing the suit allows one to enter alternate realms (at this moment, that remains restricted to either the Shadow or the Underworld). Doing so is an act of will—the hunter must expend a point of Willpower, which charges the suit via biofeedback. At that moment, the hunter will cross over. If she’s at an Avernian Gate (where the membrane between the world of the living and the Underworld is thin), she will cross over into the Underworld. If she is anywhere else, she crosses over into the Shadow. The suit has some notable drawbacks. First is that the suit can only be used once every 12 hours. Exiting the Shadow or the Underworld generally means waiting out the downtime between uses, unless alternate means of exit are discovered. Second, the suit causes a few unpleasant physical side effects, such as paleness, vertigo, or itching. Gleipnir Restraints(••) In Norse mythology, the Gleipnir was the bond used to restrain Fenris. Since the great wolf was capable of breaking any chains used to hold him, Odin commissioned the Gleipnir from the dwarves — a thin ribbon made from six impossible things. As far as anyone knows, the device sometimes issued to TFV operatives going up against Prometheans, or any other superhumanly strong creature, isn’t made from dwarven magic. Instead, it sets up a “kinetic feedback loop.” The harder a subject struggles against it, the more it restricts movement. The most difficult thing about the Gleipnir is usually getting the subject properly restrained in the first place. Function: The Gleipnir, much like its namesake, is considerably lighter and thinner than one would expect. It resembles a thin strip of black plastic with a fingerprint panel on each end that’s coded to a specific agent. Using the Gleipnir requires the hunter to use a Restrain move while grappling a target. If the target is successfully restrained, the Gleipnir uses the creature’s force against it. Breaking free of the Gleipnir requires a number of successes on a Strength + Athletics roll equal to twice the creature’s Strength rating. Any effects that increase this rating also get figured in. For example, if a Promethean uses a Dread Power to increase its Strength from 4 to 6, the Gleipnir requires 12 successes in a single roll to break free from its grip. Gungnir Multi-Function Targeting System (••• or ••••) The Gungnir System, named for Odin’s never-missing spear, is the boon and the curse of many Task Force: VALKYRIE field teams. Integrated directly into the latest generation of standard armament (the three-dot version described here includes an integrated submachine gun; a four-dot version comes with an assault rifle), the Gungnir System is VALKYRIE top brass’ new initiative for the future of the agency, in one fell swoop improving target identification and all but eliminating collateral damage. The truth, according to cynical agents who have field-tested the device, is that target identification and guy who’s about to kill me identification aren’t necessarily the same thing, and the only way the Gungnir System is going to prevent collateral damage is by ensuring that bystanders are only accidentally killed by the bad guys. Function: The integrated scope built into a weapon outfitted with the Gungnir System is a marvelous thing. A combination night vision scope, thermal imager, and Kirlian camera, it allows a soldier to engage targets in pitch blackness and easily distinguishes most monsters from humans: vampires, of course, are well below human body temperature, while werewolves and their ilk run hot as a byproduct of their increased metabolism. Witches, psychics and the possessed demonstrate an unusual Kirlian aura that identifies them as extra-normal. For an additional Merit dot, the scope can even have etheric goggle functionality built into it, allowing the agent to target ghosts and spirits. An LED overlay tags any known supernatural entity with its Task Force: VALKYRIE designation. In addition to its target identification features, the scope is a top-of-the-line sighting system. Penalties for medium range fire are negated entirely, and long-range penalties are halved. The hunter also ignores any penalty for fighting blind when using the Gungnir System. The scope is tied directly into a fire control computer programmed to recognize the unique signatures (thermal, etheric, or Kirlian) of every supernatural creature of which Task Force: VALKYRIE has records. If the gun is pointed at a target that does not fit any target profile, the safety is automatically engaged and the gun will not fire. In theory, this means that it is impossible for a VALKYRIE soldier to accidentally shoot a bystander during an engagement. In practice, it means that the weapon tends to refuse to fire at a monster’s mortal servants, cultists, or slashers. Special: The majority of agents issued a Gungnir System weapon quickly learn of a field modification that strips out the safety controls while leaving the scope and target recognition software intact. This hack requires an extended Dexterity + Computers roll, with each roll representing an hour’s worth of careful soldering and rewiring. The hunter must achieve 10 successes to complete the modification. Task Force: VALKYRIE comes down hard on agents discovered to have modified their weapons in this manner, with court martial the least severe reprimand. Huginn Visor (•• or •••) Vampires seem to have no end of abilities to sway the minds and will of mankind at their disposal. There is one drawback, however, and that is a seeming need for eye contact—the window of the soul, so to speak—on the part of the vampire. That’s where the Huginn Visor comes in, made of a dark, reflective glass that makes such contact nearly impossible. Civilian issue sunglasses prove ineffective against the powers of the enemy, so much so that an agent would not trust his cell’s integrity to simply wearing dark sunglasses. Doubly so considering the kinds of sensitive information Task Force: VALKYRIE agents are privy to. The solution lies in just the right combination of polarization and treatment with strange “chemicals.” Field agents used to joke the stuff comes from the wings Top Brass pulled off of faeries. They aren’t far off. The primary style of Huginn visor is innocuous enough to be worn in the field, and lends weight to the image of the prototypical Man in Black. Little do civilians know just how important those dark glasses can be. The two-dot version is the sunglasses. A three-dot version actually represents a contact lens variant. This variant is stealthier, not to mention with a swift swipe a vampire can knock a pair of glasses off a hunter’s head. However, the lenses are slightly less efficient (see below). Function: If a monster’s mind-altering Dread Powers (such as Fury, or Sleep) necessitate eye contact, the creature suffers a -3 penalty when used against an agent equipped with the two-dot sunglasses variant, and -2 dice if the agent is equipped with the three-dot contact lens variant. Note that both versions of the Huginn Visor can damage an agent’s ability to see in poorly-lit areas—in such places, the wearer suffers -2 to all sight-based Perception rolls. Intersticies Calculation Expedient (•) VALKYRIE has long posited the existence of interstitial terrain (see below for more information), but hasn’t been able to prove it—yes, some agents have experienced it, but the subjective experiences of individual hunters cannot be used as proof for anything. Now, they have a device that tracks and records instances of interstitial terrain. The device is portable, though not easily concealable (the screen itself is about as big as an iPhone or GPS device, but the housing for the tracker necessitates a backpack that weighs about 30 lbs). Function: No roll is necessary to calculate the location of nearby interstices. It only tracks a half-mile radius, and only identifies instances of interstitial terrain that have appeared in an area within the last 24 hours. It identifies signature etheric traces, noting the residue. The screen features a GPS device, and the terrain is noted on the map via a blinking red pulse. Mjolnir Cannon (•••• or •••••) When facing off against the unnamed horrors of the night, Task Force: VALKYRIE agents find it comforting to know they are armed with such stalwarts of high technology as “ray guns.” The Mjolnir Cannon may not be quite on par with Hollywood’s offerings, but it packs a wallop that can put down rioting humans and fanged monstrosities with equal ease. This weapon, which resembles an exceptionally bulky assault rifle (Size 3), operates by firing an intense, high-frequency laser beam that ionizes the air, creating a channel of extremely conductive plasma. The gun then sends an electrical charge into this channel, and the ionized air carries the charge to its target and delivers a long-range, high-impact shock. Function: The Mjolnir Cannon operates like a normal ?rearm, with a few exceptions, as described below. Dice Pool: Dexterity + Firearms. Roll Results Dramatic Failure: The gun backfires, delivering its full charge to the wielder instead of the target. Failure: The beam misses its target and inflicts no damage. Success: The Mjolnir Cannon inflicts bashing damage from electricity on its target. As long as a single success is rolled, the target takes the full damage from the weapon. The man-portable version of the Mjolnir Cannon can be set to one of three settings, inflicting either 6 or 8 points of bashing damage, or 4 points of lethal damage. Exceptional Success: In addition to taking bashing damage, the target loses its next turn. Special: A Mjolnir Cannon has a battery rated for 16 shots before depletion. The more damaging settings consume more power; inflicting 6 bashing counts as 2 shots, and 8 bashing damage or 4 lethal costs 4 shots. The Mjolnir Cannon has a range of 100/200/400. A larger, vehicle-mounted version of the Mjolnir Cannon also exists, costing 5 Merit dots. The vehicle-mounted cannon is seldom issued to urban strike teams, due to its lack of concealment, but in rural areas or regions already gripped by war, it can provide vital tactical support. The vehicle-mounted version works just like its smaller cousin, with the following exceptions: the weapon has two additional settings, inflicting 10 bashing or 5 lethal damage, respectively. The range of the vehicle-mounted cannon is 300/600/1,200, and its battery holds the capacity for 50 shots. The 10 bashing setting counts as 8 shots, while 5 lethal counts as 16. The Mjolnir Cannon is essentially man-made lightning; while that makes it a potent tool on the battlefield, it can interact dangerously when actual lightning is brought into the mix. The plasma channel created by the cannon attracts lightning; whenever the weapon is used in a thunderstorm, treat any failed attack roll as a dramatic failure to represent an errant bolt finding the plasma channel and following it back to the hapless hunter. Munin Serum (••••, Renewable) No matter how black the black ops or how covert the covert strike team, on occasion, witnesses to Task Force: VALKYRIE operations survive the initial fracas. Sometimes it’s a bystander in the wrong place at the wrong time, sometimes it’s the newly freed victim of a possessing entity or the liberated thrall of a warlock. Sometimes, those witnesses start to ask awkward questions. Since secrecy is one of the organization’s paramount directives, the silence of these witnesses must be guaranteed. In the old days, that meant a couple of ounces of lead in the back of the head; nowadays, VALKYRIE operatives prefer to use less messy alternatives. Munin serum — or, as it’s more colloquially known, “memory cleanser” or “Brain-O” — is a cocktail of narcotics, psychedelics and memory-inhibitor drugs that can completely suppress the last six hours of a subject’s memory. Extensive application of the drug can lead to addiction, illness and even death. New VALKYRIE recruits are frightened with campfire tales of agents who injected themselves with Munin serum to forget the horrific things they’d seen, only to end up wasted, cancer-ravaged addicts desperately jonesing for a taste of the high they can never quite remember. Function: Munin serum must be administered by injection directly into the spinal column just below the cervical vertebrae. The process is excruciatingly painful and subjects are usually sedated before being treated. If an agent wishes to administer Munin serum to an aware and unwilling target, he must first successfully grapple his target. Once the target is held securely, he must succeed on a Strength + Medicine “attack” at a -2 penalty (the actual penalty is -3 for targeting the victim’s head, but Task Force: VALKYRIE distributes Munin serum in large, sturdy hypodermics that count as +1 weapons). As long as the hunter scores at least one success on this attack, he may dose the target. Each dose affects one hour of the subject’s memory; a single syringe of the serum contains six doses. (Each instance of the Munin Syndrome Merit buys the hunter one syringe.) When the serum is injected, the subject’s player rolls Stamina + Composure in a contested action against a dice pool of 7, representing the serum’s potency. If the subject rolls more successes, she is left woozy and disoriented, as though she had taken a potent (-3) hallucinogen. If the serum rolls more successes, the character’s memory is wiped out for an amount of time corresponding to the number of doses injected. Only one resistance roll is made, no matter how many doses are injected. The subject experiences the memory loss as a similar sensation to an alcohol-induced blackout. Some refer to it as “lost time.” Special: If an individual is subject to a number of doses of Munin serum greater than her Stamina within a week or less, the toxic side effects of the drug build up to critical levels and the subject is treated as though she had ingested a poison with a Toxicity of 7. If a subject is given more doses of Munin serum than her Stamina over the course of a month without triggering the overdose described above, she must succeed on a Stamina + Resolve roll or develop the Addiction Flaw focused on the serum. The Munin Serum Merit is Renewable; once per story per instance of the Merit a hunter possesses, Task Force: VALKYRIE will resupply him with a syringe of Munin Serum. Odin Reticle (•••) Prerequisite: Huginn Visor (••) The Huginn Visor (two-dot sunglasses variant only) can be outfitted with a small LCD attachment called an Odin Reticle. This little display overlays one eye and its purpose is to pierce the supernatural stealth possessed by vampiric and other ENEs. Intel suggests vampires are not capable of achieving true invisibility; rather they cloud the minds of pedestrians to overlook them. Just in case, R&D didn’t take any chances. Applying the Odin Reticle over one eye, an agent becomes capable of piercing any ENEs’ attempts to evade detection through a variety of techniques. The ENE will appear apparent in the eyepiece by way of a process called Resonant Afterimage Processing (RAP). Despite early successes, only a limited amount of Odin Reticle prototypes were made. Agents interested in field testing equipment should contact their superior officers for more information. Function: The Odin Reticle snaps in place and remains largely concealed by the Huginn Visor. A thin cord runs back to the power source and processor that rests in the ear, no larger than a standard issue earpiece. Hunters equipped with an Odin Reticle gain a bonus of +3 on any dice roll attempting to detect vampiric and other ENEs using stealth- and evasion-based Dread Powers (such as Lurker in Darkness). Screamer Pistol (•••) A witch who can’t concentrate can’t work magic. Quantifying and diverting etheric energy is hard, and fucking with someone’s head is much easier. The screamer pistol generates a beam of ultra-low frequency sound. At a distance, the low frequency sound leads to hallucinations and altered states of consciousness as the vibrations interfere with the target’s inner ear. Up close the effects are more impressive, wrecking the target’s ability to concentrate. In some extreme cases, the vibrations hit the resonant frequency of the human bowel, causing it to empty — sometimes called the “brown note.” No mage can keep the mental image of a spell ready through that. The pistol doesn’t just work on mages. (While it affects higher brain functions, it’s still pretty useless against werewolves — something in the sounds causes them to go frothing mad, like dogs hearing a certain pitch.) Anything with a sense of balance and coherent thought processes gets the full blast at range, but only living creatures with human bodies suffer the most extreme effects. Function: A Screamer Pistol is a ranged weapon, subject to all normal rules for ranged combat. Attacking with the Screamer Pistol is a Dexterity + Firearms roll with a +3 modifier to represent the weapon’s equipment bonus. As a focused beam of sound, the pistol doesn’t deal damage. Roll Results Dramatic Failure: The Screamer Pistol unleashes a burst of low-frequency sound without any focus. Anyone within five feet, including the wielder, suffers the effects of a success. Fixing the focusing apparatus needs five successes on an extended Intelligence + Crafts roll, with each roll representing one minute of work. Failure: The beam misses the intended target, causing no ill effects. Success: The target suffers strange hallucinations and cannot concentrate for at least one turn. Compare the number of successes rolled to the target’s Composure. Each success above the victim’s Composure is one turn above the first in which the target cannot focus enough to use any supernatural powers. (If the successes are equal to or less than the target’s Composure, the victim still suffers that requisite one turn without powers.) Exceptional Success: In addition to any other effects, the target voids his bowels. The target suffers a -3 penalty to all Social rolls for the remainder of the scene. Special: A Screamer Pistol has no effect on creatures that don’t have higher cognitive functions. Werewolves fly into a frenzy against the wielder when targeted due to their enhanced hearing. Tranq Rounds (• to •••••; Renewable) Tranquilizer bullets are at the cutting-edge of ballistics technology. Ten years from now, they could be available in gun shops, but until the rounds can be mass produced, VALKYRIE keeps a close track on them. Each bullet is made of the same frangible polymer used in Glaser rounds, but containing a gel suspension of tranquilizers that are quickly absorbed through the skin and into the body. Function: Tranq Rounds do little appreciable damage. Against objects, they are useless. Against living targets, a successful roll deals only one point of lethal damage, no matter how many successes were scored on the attack. Every hit also delivers a potent tranquilizer that gives the target a -1 penalty to all rolls. Once the target’s penalties from the tranquilizer are equal to his Stamina, he must spend a point of Willpower or lose consciousness. If he remains active, each further hit with a Tranq Round requires another Willpower expenditure. The negative modifier wears off after 10 minutes, but a target rendered unconscious remains in that state for at least half an hour. Special: The Tranq Rounds Merit is Renewable; for each dot the character has in this Merit, Task Force: VALKYRIE supplies him with one clip of Tranq Rounds for a specific weapon type (e.g. MP-5, Glock 19) every session. A character may purchase multiple instances of Tranq Rounds, each specifying a different weapon. For example, an assault team leader might have Tranq Rounds (AR-15) ••• and Tranq Rounds (P90) ••; every session, he has three magazines worth of tranquilizer ammo for his AR-15 and two magazines for his P90. Tranq Rounds, unlike most Advanced Armory Merits, can be used by anyone, even if they lack a Task Force: VALKYRIE RFID chip. Urban Response Vehicle (••; Special) Durability 8, Size 16, Structure 24, Acceleration 15, Safe Speed 110 (75 mph), Maximum Speed 176 (120 mph), Handling 1. Though it’s difficult to drive an armored car through town and not draw attention, the fact is that some jobs and locations require a more forceful and timely response than others. Recently put into limited production, the Urban Response Vehicle (URV) provides Task Force: VALKYRIE members with light armored vehicle capability disguised as a standard full-sized van. As the name implies, the URV was designed for covert urban operations and would require some serious overhauling for use off-road. Function: Every TF:V member of a cell may contribute towards the Merit cost of the URV. Standard features of the URV include onboard computer and GPS, bullet-proof glass, RFID locks (the normal locks are dummies), military winch, run-flat tires (each blown tire only imposes a -1 penalty to Drive rolls and a 10% speed penalty), and police cruiser type search lights. It is equipped with air conditioning and internal oxygen supply (the URV can quickly be rigged to operate as air-tight), an overcharged engine, and enough juice from a mini-generator to power all of the features and any add-ons. The vehicle sports concealed armor plating that makes the URV nearly invulnerable to small arms fire and was designed to transport one driver, three passengers and one gunner. In addition to the onboard features, an URV can be further enhanced by Advanced Armory Endowments: -Etheric Windows (functions exactly like Etheric Goggles, may be toggled on and off by voice command), -Pintle-mounted Bleeder (operated by passenger, unfolds from the front passenger side roof and unlocks a hatch that allows a standing passenger to operate the weapon. ). -vehicle-mounted Mjolnir Cannon (5 dot version. To operate, the gunner seats himself in the gunner chair, pushes a button, the roof of the vehicle slides open and the .50 cal is elevated via hydraulic lift to a height even with the top of the URV. The machine gun uses both a swivel mount and pedals to achieve an 180 degree field of fire,). VDSB (•••) Ever since Murnau’s Nosferatu, the knowledge that vampires are destroyed by the light of the sun has entered the pop culture lexicon, along with wooden stakes, crosses and garlic (never mind that, as far as Task Force: VALKYRIE has been able to determine, two of those are complete nonsense). While VALKYRIE’s scientists have not yet found the key component of sunlight that causes such deleterious effects on the bloodsuckers, they have developed the next best thing. Function: The VDSB (Victim-Detonated Sun Bomb) is an explosive device that is rigged to trigger via an infrared sensor and thermal imager; when an object with a core temperature of less than 94ºF breaks the infrared beam, the device is triggered. Instead of an explosion, the VDSB (which looks like a generic satchel charge but contains far more complex innards) uses a combination of full-spectrum phosphorescent lights and focusing mirrors to create a blinding flash that is, from an electromagnetic standpoint, identical to sunlight. While the light doesn’t actually harm vampires, it can cause a surge of panic that overwhelms their rational mind and leads them to make tactical errors. Arming the device is simple enough, necessitating success on an instant Wits + Crafts roll. However, unless operating in total darkness, the VDSB must also be concealed, necessitating six successes on an extended Wits + Crafts roll, with each roll representing 10 minutes’ worth of work. Disarming the bomb is more time-consuming, requiring six successes on a Wits + Crafts roll, with each roll representing one minute of work. Disarming the bomb is more difficult, requiring six successes on a Wits + Crafts roll, with each roll representing one minute of work. Once the tampering process starts, though, the disarmer only has four minutes, or four rolls, in which to disarm the device. Once that time ticks down, the device detonates if it hasn’t been neutralized. Humans and monsters not afraid of sunlight within 5 yards must succeed at a roll of (Stamina - 5) or be temporarily blinded. When a vampire or other creature vulnerable to bright light is caught within the area of a VDSB, the effects are far more pronounced. The vampire’s player must immediately make an extended Resolve + Composure roll, with each roll representing one turn. Each turn in which the vampire’s player rolls at least one success, he maintains his composure for one further turn. If at any time the vampire fails to gain any successes on a roll, he flies into a frenzy of fear in which his only objective is to flee from the source of the light. He will attack anyone who gets in his way, but otherwise just tries to get away. If the vampire accumulates five successes on the extended roll, he shakes off the flight instinct and can act normally. Special: A VDSB can only be used once before it must be refitted; the intensity of the flash burns out the light sources in a single use. Unlike the Equalizer grenade, a VDSB can be refitted in the field with a minimum of fuss. Refitting a Sig mine requires full spectrum lights available from most science-novelty or pet stores for a Resource cost of • and 15 successes on an extended Intelligence + Craft roll. Each roll represents 20 minutes of work. Witch Buster (•) Many of the creatures Task Force: VALKYRIE hunts display an unusual degree of sensitivity to psychic phenomena. Witches seem to be the most adept at this sort of thing, displaying an uncanny knack for poking their noses into supernatural affairs that should be invisible to mere mortals. As witches are also among the most difficult antagonists to identify, VALKYRIE scientists developed a sort of psychic booby trap to identify potential hostiles. Official rules of engagement state that the “witch buster” is to be used to flush out known quarry that has gone to ground, but field teams often engage is a game variously referred to as “wizard baiting” or “fishing for Potters,” in which a witch buster is set up in a public but discreet location and anyone who drops by to have a look is tagged and monitored. Ever since a Glaswegian cell went a little off the reservation back in ’98 and just started killing everyone that poked around the witch buster, this tactic is expressly forbidden by VALKYRIE doctrine. Function: The witch buster is roughly the size and shape of a hockey puck, with a sticky adhesive backing that allows it to be mounted on walls or ceilings. Powered by an ordinary lithium-ion battery, the kind that can be purchased at any cell phone store, the witch buster slowly but persistently leaks a small amount of etheric energy — theoretically, not enough to be harmful (although quite a few field agents swear otherwise), but enough to register on a witch’s psychic radar. In game terms, the witch buster triggers a witch’s Unseen Sense Merit. Because their Unseen Sense Merit registers any type of supernatural disturbance, mages are the most likely to perceive a witch buster, but any character with an Unseen Sense Merit relating to ghosts, spirits, or Twilight phenomena will sense a witch buster. Supernatural powers or spells that sense disturbances in Twilight or detect ghosts or spirits will also register the witch buster as an odd, not-immediately-explicable twinge. A witch buster has eight hours of battery life before it must be recharged. Three successes on an extended Intelligence + Crafts roll, with each roll representing 10 minutes of work, allows a hunter to tap into a building’s electrical wiring and hook the witch buster in, allowing it to operate as long as the building has power.